Art is, by definition, something human and present among us for thousands of years. This discipline, over the centuries, has diversified enormously. Today, for example, there are artificial intelligences that make art (such as Dall-E 2 or Stable Difussion) and there are also many people who have made art their way of life.
However, and as much as we have defined artistic expression as something purely human, there are exceptions to the rule and the case of Catherine Chalmers is one of them. This 66-year-old American artist first graduated from Stanford University, one of the most demanding and prestigious in the world, and then obtained a master’s degree in Art. The curious thing about the case is that her first degree was in Engineering but it was finally audiovisual that gave her international recognition.
But what is his work about? Why did she exhibit in museums as important as the MoMa in New York, and win scholarships as important as the Guggenheim? We can say that her work is based – as she herself says – on “an interaction between art, science and nature.” But this is not all because Chalmers usually “invites” different kinds of small animals to her works: mice, snakes and, lately, cockroaches and ants.
All this may seem frightening to some, but let’s remember that sometimes art consists precisely of showing the best of the worst. In that sense, Chalmers’ works are amazing because they show us the same insects that we usually fight converted into mysterious figures or as the protagonists of portraits and videos that seem to have been filmed on another planet.
The greatness of the small
“Our culture is much richer with the inclusion of other forms of life” is one of the phrases that Chalmers says and one that most represents his vision of art. By entering his website, https://www.catherinechalmers.com/we will realize this instantly: almost all of his works, except for a few, have at least one animal as the protagonist, and in the cases of ants or cockroaches, these appear in massive quantities, like armies of artists.
One of his most iconic works is “Executions”, which is a compilation of photographs showing American cockroaches in death situations; electrocuted, hanged or even exterminated in a gas chamber, reminding us of the atrocities that occurred more than 70 years ago in Nazi Germany. Another memorable work is undoubtedly “Colonize the Earth” for its translation into Spanish “Colonizar la tierra”, where he photographed a hundred ants working together and holding leaves with letter shapes, with a more than incredible result.
But even with everything achieved, it remains to be said that Catherine Chalmers, in addition to being an engineer and artist, is a climate activist. On her website, there is a section called “Blog” where she tells about her productions and, recently, she gives her opinion about climate change and how it totally affects her work. For her, animals are the source of inspiration and creation, so a change in their habitat or way of living also changes their art and her own.
In his video “We Rule” or in the previously mentioned “Colonize the Earth” he leaves a message for all of Humanity, and that is that ants work together and for the same objective, without taking advantage of each other or needing anything from others. They build their own empire without the need to exterminate others.
Therefore, in a world where there is less and less art and more destruction, it is sometimes necessary to focus on the things that surround us: a little San Antonio cow, walking dogs or even, as this artist proposes, marching ants, Although it may not seem like it, they are also art.
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